After visiting 5 new events in January, February started with a combination of illness, bad weather, and a need to be nearby. So my first 3 weeks involved Longrun Meadow, Longrun Meadow, and Burnham & Highbridge – only really venturing as far as Burnham because Longrun was cancelled. All this meant I was absolutely determined to get some tourism in this weekend. Then Ben injured himself.

Granted, that’s worse for Ben than it is for me, but I was going stir crazy. So I had a search for events Ben and I had done but Lani hadn’t, that aren’t too far away, and were unlikely to be cancelled for ground conditions and a bit of wind. Eastville parkrun ticked all of these, with the added bonus that we never got round to writing it up last time. Oh and the extra added bonus that they needed volunteers, and so signing Ben up to barcode scan meant we actually had to go.

Eastville parkrun takes place in Eastville Park in Bristol, right next to junction 2 of the M32. Parking is available at the nearby Tesco, and then there’s a short walk under the motorway (KK was very excited by the tunnels) to get to the park. The path enters near the bottom of the park, so you need to walk up the hill to the gathering area. Ben went on ahead to check in, and I eventually got the kids up the hill.

As it was a new event for Lani, we went to the First Timers’ Briefing. This was really well done, with someone pointing the route out on a map while the course was described. The route is essentially short lap, lake/big lap, short lap. Oh and the entire park is on a slope. We headed over to the start area for the main briefing, with runners standing either side of the path to keep it clear until the actual start. Ben joined us for a photo, and then headed off to watch.

Having clearly heard all of both briefings, I somehow failed to hear the actual start, and suddenly noticed people were moving. The start was unsurprisingly slow, what with being at the back of over 500 people. Lani decided the best way to handle this was to skip along – showing somewhat that she was out of practice at the whole endurance thing.

After a short flat stretch across the path, the route turns right down a long hill. The kids had been looking forward to this, but with so many people in front we struggled to get any speed up. The path flattens out at the corner at the end of the path, but another corner had us heading back up the hill towards the start. Looking over to the left we could see the lake down below, which was a nice distraction.

To complete the small lap, you turn back onto the path you started on to cut across the path again. We got lots of cheering because a) Ben was there, b) we were wearing cow cowls, and c) Lani looks super cute while running. Heading back down the hill a second time we were able to stretch our legs and enjoy the hill more. The downside to this was Lani then needed to stop to take her jumper off, which took us quite a while.

Once going again, we took the path at the bottom of the park down towards the lake area. This section had more marshals due to potential for going wrong and ending up by the road. It also had some bollards dressed up in hi-viz jackets, which is a really effective way of helping people to avoid them. The path follows the river for a short while, before reaching the ornamental lake.

The loop round the lake was a big hit with the kids, as there were swans and ducks to spot. Just as well really, as Lani was starting to get tired and realise we weren’t catching anyone up. That said, on the sharp climb up from the lake to the main park I struggled to keep up with her, as my buggy control round the bends wasn’t great.

The path rejoins the loop ready to climb up the hill. By this point the bulk of runners were heading round this section on their final lap, so we kept tucked in to the side as everyone passed. For the longer lap, instead of turning right towards the start/finish in the middle of the park, you continue on to the top of the park.

This is the only place where the otherwise excellent signage and marshalling had a gap. Shortly after the path goes off to the right, another path disappears off slightly to the left. By the time we got there, most runners in the area had finished and were heading off – and mostly down the path to the left. Happily another runner on our lap overtook us and confirmed that we did indeed need to stick to the more straight-on path.

The marshals throughout were really supportive, but the section round the top of the park was where I noticed it most, as there were very few runners around us. Before too long, though, we had turned the corner to head back down the other side of the park. As we went past the start/finish area we could see big queues for scanning, which struck me as a big benefit for going a bit slower.

What wasn’t a benefit though was the large number of people walking through the park having finished their run. As we rejoined the small loop to head down to the bottom of the park things were a bit of a squeeze. For most people it would have been fine to weave through, it’s just a little trickier when you have a both an under 11 to keep in arms reach and a buggy.

The final climb up the hill was arguably the easiest of the 3, despite not being the fastest, as we knew we were nearly finished. And shortly after we turned onto the path across the park, Lani asked if she could speed up for the end. Which of course she did, thus ensuring yet another massive cheer. We then wound our way through a well organised funnel, before Lani got her biggest wish of having Ben be the one to scan her head (seriously, barcode hairbands are amazing).

The support we received from other runners was amazing throughout. Many people commented on Lani’s 10 top, which led her to happily explain she’s done more than 20 now (and put me on the spot for not knowing the exact number). I finished 570th out of 573 runners, so it could have been a very different experience without the positive comments from those lapping us or who’d already finished. The big advantage of finishing so far down the pack, though, was that we didn’t have to wait long at all for Ben’s barcode scanning duties to come to an end.

With everything finished up, we walked back down the park to head back to the car. We packed the buggy away and headed into Tesco, where we had one of the best cooked breakfasts we’d had in a long time. Then it was time to pop next door to Ikea, before heading home from a very successful family parkrun.